Batman General Discussion

Floronicman and Poison Ivy seems like a strange combination to me. Was that for the purpose of a Batman-Atom crossover, because otherwise why pair a Batman villain with an Atom one? There seem to be a group of writers with an odd fixation with Floronicman. Like when Circe forms the Dark League to defeat Justice League Dark, I'd have expected either 1)more Wonder Woman Villains, 2) Villains originating specifically from each Justice League Dark member's individual comic book series. 3) more public domain characters like Circe. Pretty much anything but the lineup we got, Floronic Man was one of the most unexpected. Was that the point? Good job if it was.

And on Poison Ivy herself, exactly when and why did she up and takeover Thorn's niche? Thorn was supposed to be the evil plant controlling vamp redhead of Gotham City! I can understand not using Thorn in Batman stories, as she was a Green Lantern villain(though that doesn't stop Floronic Man), but how did Batman get his own Thorn when he apparently had this Lilac man as a plant villain already?

Louie was exclusive to the TV show, and Ivy and Floronic Man was a thing in Neil Gaiman's Secret Origins for her. Pre-Crisis, Marc LeGrand talked her into assisting him with the theft of an Egyptian artifact containing ancient herbs. Fearing she would implicate him in the theft, he attempts to poison her with the herbs, which are deadly and untraceable. She survives this murder attempt and discovers she has acquired an immunity to all natural toxins and diseases.

Thorn was also a Flash and Green Lantern villain, not a Batman villain, though her plant powers do seem to be a prototype for Ivy—when Ivy was first made she was merely a greedy Vamp who could "scale walls like ivy". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rose_and_Thorn

Edited by lalalei2001 on Mar 2nd 2024 at 7:30:08 AM

In the case of Poison Ivy, it’s probably got a lot to do with Alan Moore’s use of Woodrue as the villain at the start of his Swamp Thing run. The origin that paired them was by Neil Gaiman, who was particularly influenced by Moore early on, and was being set up to take over Swamp Thing before Rick Veitch’s acrimonious departure from the title put him off.

Other uses of the Floronic Man might be Moore-influenced as well, though without the links being quite as strong.

I remember when he used to be an Atom villain. XD

Floronic Man did get big when Alan Moore used him.

He was great in Swampy, that whole arc where he hijacked Swampy's powers and their resulting conflict was epic as hell.

Surprisingly, the only other thing to use the "Jason Woodrue turns Pam Isley into Poison Ivy" origin was Batman and Robin.

I think the BTAS comics did it too, if not in the show itself.

I knew about Poison Ivy's origins as a wall crawling vamp. That's why I'm stumped at how she came to essentially take Thorn's place. She's like a less severe case of Scarlet Witch becoming a planetary/universal reality warper, or Adam Warlock becoming space Jesus. I didn't realize Thorn was Flash's villain either, but that's a development I can get behind. She makes a lot more sense for a manly man with a weakness to plants than a lovably dorky investigator like Jay Garrick. I mean, I get that her split personality would through Jay off, but it seems like a one off gimmick for him.

I really didn't know Thorn's whole story. Why she hated her own kids so much. I figured there was something to that, but never got around to looking into it. Now it all makes sense. I didn't know about the Silver Age heroic Thorn either. I vaguely remember Floronic Man being in Swamp Thing too, but he still wasn't something I associated with Swamp Thing when I heard he was showing up in Justice League Dark. I forgot that detail about him stealing Swamp Thing's powers...or maybe I just didn't know to begin with.

I honestly wasn't the biggest fan of Swamp Thing even with Alan Moore's changes. I respect Moore as a writer, but I often don't enjoy his work, if that makes any sense. With Swamp Thing in particular I don't like the concept of "The Green". I think Swamp Thing being some avatar of plant life was a good idea, but I think the way Moore went about it was too simplistic for the global/cosmic eon spanning scale we were supposed to buy Swamp Thing operating on. Still, I respect that run, like just making a villain more powerful than Antimontior by several orders of magnitude when told to write a tie in to Crisis On Infinite Earths. Just pissing on the company wide project and getting away with it? I have to respect that. I guess Floronic Man gaining a following isn't too surprising in that light, but I was just thinking "doesn't he fight The Atom?". Poison Ivy getting dragged into that following is still weird.

Edited by IndirectActiveTransport on Mar 2nd 2024 at 1:22:56 PM

Right now Rose and Thorn are referenced in two of Ivy's plant daughters named Rose and Thorn (There was a third named Hazel). This being comics, they're very human-looking.

An old story had Ivy go after Thorn with a handgun and lose badly.

Edited by lalalei2001 on Mar 2nd 2024 at 10:08:59 AM

I think the first time Poison Ivy and The Floronic Man were seen together was during Crisis on Infinite Earths. He'd subdued the Freedom Fighters with vines and such, and she admires his handiwork.

I think they got put together because it seemed natural—two characters with plant themes, even though Poison Ivy for a long time didn't really have anything to do with plants aside from her costume theme (she could "cling to walls like ivy").

Edited by Robbery on Mar 2nd 2024 at 10:20:47 AM

One of Ivy's first appearances (in a Wonder Woman comic istr) had her complaining about having to be in a jungle and saying she hated it.

This page has a nice rundown of Poison Ivy facts, including her first origin story, first bio, the first time she controlled plants, etc.

http://poisonivycollection.blogspot.com/p/interesting-facts-about-poison-ivy.html

A case of Meet Your Early-Installment Weirdness with Ivy would be fun.

Edited by lalalei2001 on Mar 2nd 2024 at 2:39:49 PM

Today I learned that Batman shares a name with a province + district in Turkey.

Batman Dark Age, the successor to Superman: Space Age, has its first issue release late this month.

I'm guessing this one will go from the 40's to the 60's as opposed to Superman's 60s-80s timeline.

That huge milk billboard ad is definitely of the Golden Age.

Edited by lalalei2001 on Mar 5th 2024 at 10:58:37 AM

The second variant cover is largely 50s-60s, but has designs outside that range from Kane up to Miller, Breyfogle and Kelley Jones.

Edited by Dayraven1 on Mar 5th 2024 at 8:09:09 AM

In today's issue of Batman, Bruce's family can't tell him apart from a robot. Just one Something Only They Would Say bit is enough to convince them that Failsafe/Zurr-en-Arrh is the real deal.

...Does Chip Zdarsky have something against the Batfamily or something? Because this is just frustrating.

On the other hand, the imposter is nicer to Jason than Bruce has been this run.

Edited by reppuzan on Mar 5th 2024 at 10:04:28 AM

I meant to be fair to them, they are still unsure, bruce had been acting like a paranoid jackass for months, and zur is him and has all his memories. only damian really seemed to buy it, the rest of the family thinks even if it is bruce its zur in the drivers seat

The funny thing is the story Zur uses on Damian doesn't line up with what actually happened when Damian moved in.

Bruce wasn't that close to Damian at that point.

Introducing Robot-Batman!

Okay how many evil is that? City of Madness already introduced Cthulu Batman.

I wonder if Ra's al Ghul got his plan in JLA: Tower of Babel from Carmen Sandiego: Word Detective, where Carmen did... basically the exact same thing he does but 3 years earlier.

EDIT: Lol, the Nightmare Fuel page for the Carmen game notes the similarity!

Edited by lalalei2001 on Mar 6th 2024 at 1:11:59 PM

Ra's al Ghul probably got that plan from the original Tower of Babel story in The Bible. Which predates the comic and that game for literal millennia, so it inspired both.

He wasn't even the first Batvillain to hatch such a plan. Scarecrow already had launched a city wide variant in the Batman TAS tie in comic several years before that.

Probably, yeah, I just thought it was amusing that a Carmen Sandiego game also had the plot. XD

Man, I wanna see more stories of Ra's matching wits with heroes in historical eras. There's Jonah Hex, but what about something like a young Uncle Sam dealing with Ra's during the War of 1812 or something

It'd make sense for a Batman character to fight other Batman type characters throughout history. There's plenty enough in the public domain as is, like Zorro, Doc Savage, The Phantom, The Shadow. Then again, after that ridiculous tracking at sea feat that allowed Ra's to find New 52 Themyscira, maybe he should really be fighting Sinbad the sailor. I don't know if the timelines match up, but it's a setting with time travel and magic to explain that away if they don't.

The Phantom, The Shadow, and Doc Savage aren't public domain yet. The Phantom should become so in 2032, and the Shadow in 2027, and Doc Savage in 2029. Zorro is, though.

Edited by Robbery on Mar 6th 2024 at 8:44:13 AM